Queen Elizabeth, Code 2022, and Return of the Dawg!

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Kara Swisher: Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher from the Beverly Hilton at the Code Conference in Los Angeles. And today, at long last, I'm joined by the man who puts the Scott in Scott Free August, Scott Galloway.

[Sound effect: Superman theme song plays]

Scott Galloway: Once there was a world... A podcast... But that world had been invaded by people with more charisma... Who will save us? Who will save us from these woke people? Who will come? Who will be inappropriate? The dog! That's right! That's right! You're welcome, Kara.

Kara Swisher: Hello. What the heck? Super dog? Super dog? Super dog? Who said super dog when I was a kid at commercial? Wonder dog. Wonder dog. You're Wonder Dog. Go on.

Scott Galloway: Because he was kind of stupid.

Kara Swisher: He was a little dumb.

Scott Galloway: He was kind of dumb.

Kara Swisher: He was likable, though.

Scott Galloway: Yes, he was a likable dumb dog.

Kara Swisher: Lackable dog. He was super. Scott, welcome back.

Scott Galloway: Thanks, Kara. It's good to be back.

Kara Swisher: I really did miss you. I really did miss you.

Scott Galloway: I know you did. I cannot believe I admit it.

Kara Swisher: Yeah.

Scott Galloway: I had great co-hosts. I missed you, too.

Kara Swisher: I had great co-hosts.

Scott Galloway: Great-ish. Some were just somewhat less great than others.

Kara Swisher: Okay, fine. But they were all very good.

Scott Galloway: No, they weren't.

Kara Swisher: But anyways, go ahead. In any case. Some better than others. People really missed you.

Scott Galloway: They missed you. Yeah, I appreciate that. And I think it was, I tried to assemble a group of people that would try to best you, but it didn't really work. George Hahn came close.

Kara Swisher: George Hahn came close. I would agree. He's my successor.

Scott Galloway: Yes. He's Bob Chapek. He's the Chapek in my Iger.

Kara Swisher: That's not a good thing. Speaking of Iger. Yeah. At the Code Conference. He's very handsome. People keep calling him a thirst trap to me, which I told him.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, he's very good looking.

Kara Swisher: He had to look up thirst trap.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, he's Dilf, right? Dilf.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, he's a daddy I'd like to, what's the term?

Scott Galloway: Yeah, there you go.

Kara Swisher: God, I don't like it when you use that type of language, Kara.

Scott Galloway: Oh, that's right.

Kara Swisher: Anyway, a lot has happened while you're away. We wanted to make sure you weren't out of loop, so I reached out to a friend of the show, George Hahn, to help you catch up on what you missed. Let's listen.

[Audio clip plays]

George Hahn: Welcome back, Scott. George Hahn here with a quick rundown of all the news you missed during Quiet August. Robin Hood, Peloton, and Snap all announced layoffs. Cox bought Axios. Amazon will buy iRobot. Not a DVD of the Will Smith movie. Andreessen Horowitz backed Adam Neumann. Walmart teamed up with Paramount+. Chipotle workers in Michigan voted to unionize. Game of Thrones came back to HBO. Kind of. The DOJ searched Mar-a-Lago. Someone assaulted Salman Rushdie. President Biden signed the CHIPS Act, the Inflation Reduction Act and canceled some student loan debt. And the New York Times ran a profile of a very handsome guy named Scott Galloway. I'm George Hahn, and this has been your August News Rundown.

[End of audio clip]

Kara Swisher: He's a jaunty fellow. Anyway, so today we'll talk about everything that happened at Code. There were some bold challenges to tech titans, threats from CEOs, promises from politicians, including a senator. It's been a very exciting few days. Queen Elizabeth, though, passed away today. Thursday. She was 96 years old and her 70-year reign was the longest in British history. 15 prime ministers, I think, somewhere like that. One queen. Britain now enters an official mourning period that will last 12 days. The London Stock Exchange could be closed for several days. And the royal, formerly known as Prince, is now King Charles III. He is 73 years old. This news comes just days after the queen appointed Liz Truss as Britain's new prime minister. She appointed her. This is maybe her 16th and then died. I really like the queen. I know you're not supposed to say you like royalty, but I find she handled herself rather beautifully over those many years and developed into a real leader.

Scott Galloway: There's all kinds of leaders you can have. It's nothing short of remarkable, because if you think about it, if you think about monarchy as an institution, or the crown is an institution, and I think institutions matter. I think organizations or people need connective tissue in the form of institutions. It's really the only monarchy that's kind of survived or hasn't ended up embarrassing the people who...

Kara Swisher: Well, they're a little embarrassing. There's been a lot of embarrassing.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, but if you think about it, I mean, imagine a CEO overseeing. So when she took over, the pound was at $4. The sun rose and set on a colony of Britain. It was the most powerful nation in the world up until World War II. And it's been in steady decline, and it's had a bit of a renaissance over the last couple decades. But I always think, how do you relate something like this for young people. And I think what she kind of, at least what I take away from her monarchy is you don't always need to respond to everything. She showed, I think, a lot of discipline and grace when she was given a hard time or when she could have weighed in to try and defend herself. Or made mistakes. But she showed tremendous resilience. She kind of has the definition of grace and also service. I can't imagine that at a lot of points in her life, she didn't look back on the guy who abdicated and said, you know what, it would have been probably a little bit easier for me just to go hunting stags and she took service very seriously. And the fact that she leaves after a 70-year reign on what has been a civilization that has gone through a lot and declined, it's just remarkable. Find another person, CEO, head of anything that has spent 70 years somewhere and comes out with their brand as strong or better than anywhere.

Kara Swisher: I think it'll be interesting in Britain. You know, there's all these controversies around the market and some of the family are just to embarrass themselves, especially Prince Andrew, I would say. And then the fighting, the sort of gossipy stuff around Harry and Meghan. It's kind of silly. That's silly to me. And it's just weird and gossipy. And I know the tabloids in London just rage at these things. But she has conducted herself with enormous grace. And despite all this, you can't control your kids. It's a weird fishbowl.

Scott Galloway: The thing I think about all the time, I was just in London at Buckingham Palace, actually. I was showing, I have a picture of Claire in front of it with Louis and Amanda. And one of the things I remember is when I told him the guy snuck in. Remember the guy snuck in twice, actually, and went to her bedroom? And just hung out with her in her bedroom. He hung out with her. And she managed to just call security. I was thinking, oh, my God, like in this day and age where you worry about people like that? I don't know. I just – condolences to Britain, whatever you think of her, good leader, very strong leader, consistent leader.

Kara Swisher: Was she in failing health? My sense is she was pretty – But my sense is she was fairly robust almost right up until the end. The last couple of months, they've been trying to protect—I think she got COVID.

Scott Galloway: Oh, is that right?

Kara Swisher: Yeah. You know, that wasn't it. It's just she's 96 years old. Yeah. And, you know, she's had a very robust life hunting. But I don't know if the monarchy will survive.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, it'll be interesting. I'm not—you know, I'm not going to shitpost the king, but I think it takes a special type of grace and resilience.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, we'll see if he can have it.

Scott Galloway: And maturity that I'm not—because here's the thing. The functional families are the ones you don't know. And no institution can predict greatness based on a bloodline. It just doesn't work that way. And so the construct is outdated.

Kara Swisher: Oh, totally. Including incorporation.

Scott Galloway: 100%. And when you're under this kind of scrutiny and this spotlight and this 24-by, these institutions that are based on bloodline don't survive, nor should they, quite frankly.

Kara Swisher: Right.

Scott Galloway: But this monarchy has had more upsides than downsides. And it'll be interesting to see if they can maintain that, you know, if they demonstrate that type of resilience with a new figurehead. And I like Charles. He was early to climate change stuff. He's a good man.

Kara Swisher: He's whiny.

Scott Galloway: I think he's a good man. He's been a little tetchy.

Kara Swisher: Oh, come on.

Scott Galloway: He was raised in Range Rovers and nannies. I get it. I get it. I get it. I get it. But one of the things is it'll be interesting. And I think probably he's an interim king, really. He's quite old. Although she lived that long. Most importantly, you know, he's an outstanding dresser.

Kara Swisher: Yes, he's a good dresser. That counts for a lot. So William will come along and we'll see where it goes. In any case, condolences.

Scott Galloway: I think you should move to L.A. and buy a Porsche and have podcasts.

Kara Swisher: Yes, that's true. That would be really good. That's Prince Harry. Yeah. You know what? Queen Elizabeth, good on you. Right on. Rest in peace. Rest in peace. Well done. Rest in peace. Say hi to Diana. A lot of the tweeting is about that.

Scott Galloway: Really?

Kara Swisher: Yeah. It's weird. Britain's getting a little mad because America's being very cheeky about the whole thing.

Scott Galloway: They're the home of cheek.

Kara Swisher: I know. No, Britain's not being cheeky. They're like, except this is our queen.

Scott Galloway: Well, I know, but okay.

Kara Swisher: There was a little bit of a pushback. You know what? We'll be respectful. You saw my tweet.

Scott Galloway: Moves to London once. And then I put the announcement that the queen died. What did you say?

Kara Swisher: I said, moves to London once. I mean, everyone's sending me messages saying, you move to London. I'm a total narcissist. Everyone's like, you move to London and look what happened. Look what happened. You're going back there now, right? You're going back.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, I'm going to Vegas first to meet with friends because partying with my fraternity brothers is more important to me than my family. But yeah, I'll be there eventually. By the way, just so you know.

Kara Swisher: Yeah.

Scott Galloway: So I know you're excited about my move. It is super easy to move a Great Dane to London. It's super easy. It's super efficient and really easy to get a 150-pound dog across the Atlantic when everybody's more worried about the dog than you. And also, I just want to shout out to our immigration system and visa system. Super efficient and well-run, Kara. Super efficient and well-run.

Kara Swisher: Can I ask a question? Are you going to come back with, like, a Madonna accent?

Scott Galloway: I know, Scottish accent.

Kara Swisher: Are you going to go, hello, Kara?

Scott Galloway: I'm going to be wearing kilts all the time. No, I'm doing this. It's too late for my oldest, but I think if my youngest gets a Scottish accent, he's just going to—

Kara Swisher: Scottish? You're living in London.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, but we're a huge Glasgow Rangers fans.

Kara Swisher: And yet you're living in London, so British accent.

Scott Galloway: But here's the thing when you have a Scottish—

Kara Swisher: You're going to get a Scottish accent in London.

Scott Galloway: Here's the thing when you have a Scottish accent, and I learned this from my father. When you have a Scottish accent, you can not only think with your dick, you can listen to it. It is the, the player, the player tool. It is the ultimate weapon of a guy looking to spread his feet to the four corners of the earth.

Kara Swisher: Do not do a British accent to me at all. Do not. Do not do cockney. Hello. No. Cockney.

Scott Galloway: It's funny because my mom, for some reason, my mom and her sisters, my mom got pulled out of school at the age of 13 out of London. Somehow, because she was good at maths, she ended up at a good school. Her other sisters have what we call like a wrong side of the tracks accent. And I like that one more. I like the bad cockney. That's probably offensive, right?

Kara Swisher: Right. No, no. Go for it.

Scott Galloway: Is that a hate crime in Britain? Everything you do is—

Kara Swisher: Because I hate crime in Britain. Anyway, go ahead. Anyways. All right. I'm very excited for your move. I'm going to miss you, but I'll be staying in your apartment in New York.

Scott Galloway: There you go. Which is fine.

Kara Swisher: You leaving is great. We will still be doing Pivot, obviously, different times and stuff like that. And we're going to be doing a lot more, actually.

Scott Galloway: Yeah.

Kara Swisher: So speaking of which, for me, it's ending. Let's talk about code. This is my last code. The code will continue.

Scott Galloway: Yeah. It was epic. 20-year reign. Two queens.

Kara Swisher: Two queens. Kara.

Scott Galloway: And I didn't have to. Two queens have a—this is—okay, let's get on to bigger news. Code 20. So can I just say something first?

Kara Swisher: Yes, please.

Scott Galloway: Congratulations. But I made an observation. Okay. The thing that struck me about Code this year, I think you're smart, and I think it shows a lot of wisdom to leave while people are still applauding. Because I look at this format. I mean, let's talk about who you brought. Evan Spiegel, you know, the CEO of Snap. Oh, who's the CEO of the most valuable company in the world? Tim Cook. He was here. Oh, but what about Steve Jobs? Well, his wife and Johnny Ive were here. Oh, but what about Google? Oh, the CEO was here. I mean, for what this is, the CEO of Amazon, for what this is, it just couldn't be better. But here's the thing, and I hope you don't take this the wrong way. It's always a bad thing to say. You're the tallest **** right now. I think this format, I think the sun has passed midday. And I think you have really great business instincts and have decided, I'm going to ring the bell at the top and move to the next thing. Because I think this format of getting famous tech people on stage.

Kara Swisher: I would agree. I think it's losing its shine.

Scott Galloway: I don't think it's losing its shine.

Kara Swisher: And it's that, you know, after a while of yelling at essentially white guys over many years, and I don't mind doing it, I'm very good at it. I think I want to change it out into something fresh. We're going to do some pivot stuff. And how do you rethink it? But how do you present it? And what can you show? I thought this morning when we did the climate change stuff with people you've never heard of, people were – so many people came up to me. There's lots of ways to do interesting things. It doesn't have to be a panel. I want to rethink events because I do like the community aspects of it. I had dozens – we had a lot of younger people here, if you notice. We had a program to bring in lots of young people. Someone just came up to me, a younger person, and said, this has – I needed a push to be thinking about things, especially around the climate change stuff and different things. That was good. And I think the inspirational nature of gatherings is really important. So I don't want to give up on gatherings. I want to give up on – I don't want to give up on this one either. It's just like I don't want to do it. I made this cake many, many, many times, and I made a really good one this time.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, you're leaving while people are applauding, and that takes discipline. I think – I've been thinking about ours. I think we need Rufus DeSol and edibles.

Kara Swisher: I know you do. I know you feel like.

Scott Galloway: We need some really cool music acts and some edibles.

Kara Swisher: Let's talk about any of this because I designed it. I really designed it the way it is. Two of the biggest themes of the week, which came out, and one I was surprised about was what to do about TikTok and whether any of our speakers were running for president. Now, interestingly, Vanessa Pappas was supposed to come and she got sick and she couldn't come. I don't think she would have enjoyed this.

Scott Galloway: No, she wouldn't have because everyone was like, Matthias Dopfner.

Kara Swisher: It's Matthias. I live in Europe. I'll help you. Thank you. Matthias Dopfner.

Scott Galloway: Dopfner.

Kara Swisher: Matthias Dopfner. Barfen Nugent. He's very tall. He's a very big man. And unfortunately for him, a really sort of negative article landed the minute he got on stage the very before. But he called for the ban, the ban of TikTok.

[Audio clip plays]

Matthias Dopfner: It is, of course, a tool of espionage, as you have written just a couple of weeks ago. And I think we should just have this kind of self-respect. And that's why I concretely think TikTok should be banned in every democracy. I think it's just insane not to do that.

[End of audio clip]

Kara Swisher: But coming out of this conference, the headline news, if there's any impact here, it is that there was almost universal coagulation or consensus that TikTok is an existential threat and should be banned.

Scott Galloway: And I want to be and I have come 180 on this. Initially, I thought it was great that Facebook or Meta has some competition. And then I saw the way my 12 year old got addicted to this thing. And then I kind of did the math. If you believe there is no separation between the CCP and Chinese companies, which there is not, they disappear CEOs. It's a point you made on your wonderful program. Thank you for saying that. If you believe that China has a vested interest in the decline of American civilization or at a minimum diminishing our geopolitical power, then why on earth wouldn't they put their thumb on the scales of content that is more anti-American? And I believe they're doing that now. That's what I would do if I were them. I'd be like, let's take – if you're Kim Kardashian, Joe Rogan, or Jonathan Haidt, you have some content that's very pro-America and some content that's anti-America, and they can very easily, elegantly, and under the cover of dark, put their thumb on the scale of content that positions us in a negative light. And you know what? I think it's happening. I think they're already doing it. And if you look at polls –

Kara Swisher: And they hide it amongst the delightful stuff. And there's a lot of that. A lot of dancing and then someone saying, a young person saying, capitalism doesn't work. And then a young person saying our elections have been weaponized or you the incumbent I mean and not only that we give them a lot to work with

Scott Galloway: Yeah we certainly do

Kara Swisher: A lot of it true

Scott Galloway: But so what do you end up with? You end up with young people who a third of them believe that socialism wouldn be a better way to run our society. And so Trump got very little right. What he did get right, TikTok should be banned or spun to American interests. But it's an existential threat.

Kara Swisher: A lot of people, you know, I was going to write Vanessa, we're going to try to get her on the podcast. But definitely, someone from TikTok came up to me and they're like, we want to get away from China, essentially.

Scott Galloway: Oh, I think every person at TikTok. These are Americans.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, these are Americans.

Scott Galloway: They see the only thing in between them and their Gulfstream and their homes in the Hamptons is the lack of a Chinese wall. I think they would love for nothing. I think they're good people. I think they would love for nothing more than to get some security. It's not going to happen, though.

Kara Swisher: Well, if the evaluation by the U.S. government happens and they're working with Oracle now to separate stuff, there's still that still going on at post-Trump. It sort of died down when he stopped yelling and he tried to get a vig and this and that. But I think that they – I don't know what China will do is the thing. Like, will they allow it to happen? And that, you know, are their interest in money more than their interest in influence? And then they'll get banned.

Scott Galloway: They'll get banned.

Kara Swisher: I don't think they're afraid to –

Scott Galloway: They'll get banned. They put companies out of business because they decide – they play the long game. They're like, no, that doesn't work for us, Didi.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, oh, Jack Ma, you have some thoughts about the CCP. we're going to disappear your ass for a month.

Scott Galloway: What I mean is it's getting banned in this country eventually. And that's that. But just some data here. People under the age of 18 are spending more time on TikTok than they spend on every streaming network combined. So parents have to ask themselves, you have Disney+, Amazon Prime, Netflix, Hulu, all of them were owned by a Chinese company and that content could be influenced by the CCP. Would you be down with that?

Kara Swisher: No, no.

Scott Galloway: No, we don't think of it the same way. And again, it's wrapped in delight.

Kara Swisher: It's interesting we're talking about TikTok because they weren't here. But one of the things, the other thing we talked about, a lot of the stuff was about politics and where regulation is going and running for president. We had Bob Iger, as I said, Thirstruck Bob Iger.

Scott Galloway: You're a man crush.

Kara Swisher: Iger spoke about the future of streaming, movie going, and even answered a question from The Verge's Alex Heath with some details about Twitter bots.

[Audio clip plays]

Bob Iger: Interestingly enough, because I read the news these days about it, we did look very carefully at all of the TikTok, I'm sorry, all of the Twitter users. I guess they're called users. Yes. Yeah. And we, at that point, estimated, with some Twitter's help, that a substantial portion, not a majority, were not real.

Alex Heath: How many?

Bob Iger: I don't remember the number, but we discounted the value heavily.

Alex Heath: 10%?

Bob Iger: Heavily. Don't remember. Okay. Don't remember.

[End of audio clip]

Kara Swisher: The audience was laughing there because Bob held out his hands like he'd caught a big fish. But several people texted me today and say he's going to get subpoenaed by Elon Musk because of the things.

Scott Galloway: Really?

Kara Swisher: He said some very detailed stuff about, which I haven't seen before, you know, about his – he almost bought Twitter. He was very close.

Scott Galloway: Yeah. It was almost done.

Kara Swisher: And then over a weekend, he decided not to do it.

Scott Galloway: I mean, here's the thing. It could be 80%. It doesn't legally exonerate him from closing on the contract.

Kara Swisher: No, I get that. I get that. But I'm just saying this will be – I wonder if he'll be brought into this because we discounted the value. And then he later said that deal we had, it was pretty cheap. That was built into our economics of the deal.

Scott Galloway: I think he'll make a scene of it. He's going to use it to make a scene of it and maybe subpoena Bob Iger or make a – I don't know if that will happen.

Kara Swisher: I wrote him. I'm like, maybe you're going to get subpoenaed now and have something to do because he doesn't have anything to do now except invest and things like that. But it was interesting how close – I didn't realize how close they had come to buying that company. It sounds like –

Scott Galloway: And they were going to use it.

Kara Swisher: He said the deal was – it just needed his signature. They were going to use it not as a social media network but to distribute – they didn't have the technology essentially to make it an entertainment distribution network, which was a great idea like you've talked about with CNET and things like that. Bob also said – it was interesting that Twitter helped him.

Scott Galloway: Of course they helped him.

Kara Swisher: Iger was also bullish on Netflix. He said nothing about Discovery. He was naming things that he thought were going to survive. And Discovery Warner was not in that list. He left them out. He thought Disney was good. He was pretty honest about Disney and the challenges they face. I thought he did a great job.

Scott Galloway: Look, it's simple. There's too much investment. They've got to consolidate. Zaslav is probably doing the right thing. He realizes he can't win this spending war. He's cutting costs. Because here's the thing about Discovery Warner. There's no set of media assets in the world that are acquirable. I mean, if you look at Warner, if you look at HBO, what would Apple pay for HBO? Could it buy? Probably not. But these are assets that can't be – they take decades or generations to build, and it's one of the few set of media assets that could be acquired. That's why Twitter's in this world of – I don't want to call it – it's either a good thing. You'd say it's good for shareholders because the stock should be at 15 or 20, and it's not. It's at 43 because it can be acquired. There's no one that controls it. Speaking of which, Evan Spiegel, he controls the company.

Kara Swisher: Yeah.

Scott Galloway: And that is probably bad for shareholders. He claims it is.

Kara Swisher: No, it's not. It's a dual-class shareholder company. But Discovery you can buy. You can buy. Discovery has one class of stock because what Jeff Bukas did to John Stanky, and that is he sold him something for more than it was worth, John Stanky has now done to David Zaslav because Zaslav wants to be in Hollywood and be the man. And so he overpaid for it, and he took on $55 billion in debt.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, it's a lot.

Kara Swisher: And so if the company ends up being worth $60 billion, it means the equity value will be $5 billion and it'll go to $3.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, interesting.

Kara Swisher: And also what was interesting, when you're talking about buyers, Apple, obviously any of the tech companies, Amazon, Apple, would want to buy this company. Who will buy it? Comcast.

Scott Galloway: That's really interesting because here's the thing, and we've talked about this. You don't get to a quarter of a trillion dollars in market capitalization in Philadelphia without killing people and being smart. They're both – those guys come to play. They're smart. They have amazing assets. They have vertical distribution, whether it's Sky in the UK, whether it's Comcast here. So to get that kind of verticalization around content, they've got to do something. I don't know if it's buying real cool.

Kara Swisher: They do. Bob actually said that. They said cable companies got to get out of the cable business. Not the internet business, the cable business. And they got to push back. And so if this thing becomes cheap enough – and the thing is, they may not even need to go hostile. They might just buy a ton of the debt, a ton of the equity, and just sit around and say, all right, let us know when you're ready. They have to spin off CNN probably.

Scott Galloway: Well, I think they would with CNN. I think the good bank, bad bank here would probably be Warner and HBO because there's some synergy there around movie releases and those franchises and Lucasfilm and Marvel. And then you would spin the cable assets.

Kara Swisher: Not Marvel. Marvel's Disney.

Scott Galloway: I'm sorry. Who is it? Warner. Warner has DC Comics. Is it DC?

Kara Swisher: I could give a shit. Men in tights.

Scott Galloway: Right. Men in tights. So same, same, same. And then what you would have is then you would – the bad bank would be the cable assets that are still very profitable but in decline. And it would trade at a lower EBITDA, but you would spin that into kind of good bank, bad bank and hopefully get a higher multiple.

Kara Swisher: And there's the internet assets. Where do you put those?

Scott Galloway: Yeah, I think they'd – Connectivity. They just would – that would probably go with the cable. Who knows? At this price point, there's probably enough money in private equity that some private equity partner could convince himself into coming in and taking it private and then splitting it up.

Kara Swisher: Yeah. Something's going to happen there. It's stock. Cutting costs isn't enough.

Scott Galloway: Yeah. So I think that – I mean, we've said that something's going to happen in the next 12 months. And Disney Plus has done a great job. By the way, have you seen House of Dragon?

Kara Swisher: No.

Scott Galloway: It's really good.

Kara Swisher: I don't want to say it. It's really violent. The temperament and pointless sex.

Scott Galloway: The opening scene is really, pointless sex? That's an oxymoron.

Kara Swisher: Bob was very interesting. I think he's a really smart guy. I wanted to bring him in here. We did ask Bob Chapik to come, but Bob Iger's one of these people who has a real perspective, and now he can really talk around leadership, around lots of things, and mistakes. I thought he was very reflective and excellent.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, he's very good. He was a great interview, and he looked fantastic. He really did.

Kara Swisher: He's a handsome man.

Scott Galloway: He's a handsome man. I like his new outfit. Can you imagine if he had a Scottish accent? Oh, my God, he'd slay it. He'd slay it.

Kara Swisher: We thirst trap, Bob, look it up. Okay, one company that's not quite on top of its game, but still is innovative, Snap. We sat down with CEO Evan Spiegel, Scott and I did, for a conversation about competition, TikTok, and the future of his company. Scott had a number of pointed questions. I was the good cop in this one. I'm usually the bad cop. Let's listen to one.

[Audio clip plays]

Scott Galloway: I listened to your earnings call last night. You didn't say anything. How is your board not letting you speak on earnings calls? Why aren't you speaking? Isn't this exactly the time where CEOs should be speaking directly to investors?

Evan Spiegel: That was a huge mistake that I shouldn't have made. To be honest with you, I wasn't even thinking. I was obviously, I'm on the call. I'm waiting for a question. No one asked a question addressed to me. So it wasn't planned.

Scott Galloway: You just felt like there were other people. I don't mean to put words in your mouth.

Evan Spiegel: Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, it wasn't planned. I was waiting. I actually kind of expected a question, kind of given everything going on. But, you know, I'd also come in person in May to pre-announce that we were going to miss the bottom end of our guidance to a big investor conference, answered a bunch of investor questions there in person. So like, I wasn't thinking like, oh, I'm not engaged with investors because I spend quite a lot of time answering their questions and really helping them understand.

[End of audio clip]

Kara Swisher: So Evan, I thought did very well, even though tough questions. He's in a, you know, they laid people off. There's all kinds of problems he had. But I thought he was super articulate about his things and facing issues. What did you think of his session?

Kara Swisher: You were pointing out to something very clear. He should talk on the call for one, but he's facing a lot of headwinds. Well, his people reached out and said he wants to have a conversation with you. And I initially said no, because I know what happens. I meet these people, and they're all very likable. Not all of them. And, well, most of the ones I talk to I like. And so I don't like to talk to them. And anyways, but I had a brief conversation with them.

Scott Galloway: But there's something that really scares me, and that is there's a very dangerous calculus or alchemy in our society, and that is young men who have not experienced a lot or have not experienced a lot of hardship. You know, maybe went to Harvard or maybe went to Stanford. And then they figure out a way to have total control of their company so they don't have to listen to anybody. Which you discussed. And they have a media company that has influence over hundreds of millions of people. And it hasn't gone good places. So a young man who's known nothing but privilege, who has unfettered power over society and content. He does not. It's a small company. I think the best thing for us would have been if Facebook had never really had only reached the heights of Snap.

Kara Swisher: You're right. That's right. You made that point. You'd rather your son use Snap.

Scott Galloway: I think he's less of a mendacious fuck than either Mark or Cheryl. I think he strikes me as just more thoughtful. And also, it's more of a communications medium than an espionage.

Kara Swisher: It is. Very thoughtful peak product. And it's innovation and it's more fun. But there's just no getting around it. Young men who come from privilege, who have total control and no guardrails. No one can tell him what to do.

Scott Galloway: You sound like someone you do a podcast with, but go ahead. Keep going.

Kara Swisher: I like that I've infected you.

Scott Galloway: These are the most dangerous people in the world. And so I hope that he continues to reflect and be a thoughtful young man, which he strikes me as. But I think a lot of people would have said the same thing about Mark Zuckerberg.

Kara Swisher: Not as much. There was more signals, and you raised some of those red flags early on with conversations with him. But I don't like the idea. Young men need guardrails. Those Japanese soldiers that retreated into the hills and the Philippine Islands, they accomplished nothing except occasionally terrorizing the village without guardrails, without a board that can fire you.

Scott Galloway: I would agree with this. In this case, I think he's handled himself rather well.

Kara Swisher: I agree. So far. I don't think he has that much influence because I don't think it's that big a company. It just isn't. And I think the reason it's not that big a company is very like, remember how small Apple was until it wasn't? Because he focuses on quality of product, a really good experience. He's not willing to do the things Mark Zuckerberg was willing to do that he didn't do. That said, and he's very innovative and Facebook has copied every one of his good ideas trying to put him out of it. They tried to buy him and when he wouldn't sell, they try to kill him essentially by subsuming all this stuff. But here's what I thought he did well, is that he's been in trouble like this before when they were, and I do think he's got a bigger market. He talked about it a little bit, that they've cut back like on the Pixie, all kinds of stuff. I think he has a bigger market than you realize because I think people are weary of the Facebook experience. And my kids have not left that product, have not used it. They do not leave it. It's a utility to them. And I don't think they, the AR stuff is interesting. I think lots of people use those filters, and it's a fun way to communicate in most cases. They've made some errors in some of the filters, usually around race. But I think he's right. He's got a good little business there if he does it right. And he did cut back, and I'm probably sad about cutting back some of his very creative things because he's a very creative thinker. The problem I have is that control, that control.

Scott Galloway: That's my problem. Otherwise, I think he's a very good entrepreneur and has made a beautiful product.

Kara Swisher: Power corrupts. Yes. And you talked about it. You're right. It doesn't have two and a half or three billion like Meta. It has a half a billion. But it's not the number of people, the amount of influence. It's who it has influence over.

Scott Galloway: Right. Because I don't know about you. I found out my 14-year-old had been on Snap for a year and I didn't even know it.

Kara Swisher: Oh, I knew. I know. Oh, I'm a bad parent, but I don't like the idea. I just don't like the idea of a young man with no guardrails deciding how young people communicate with each other.

Scott Galloway: That's a fair point. You know, I like Snapchat. I found my son. It's cute. It's nice. The maps they put in.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, yeah. Louie's not very sharp. She's not the sharpest technological tag in the box. I love that. He's got the wrong mom if he's trying to pull one over on social media. It's a longer story, but Alex tried to turn on Zono's music player in his room and then came in and said he's not here. And so he and I used Snapchat maps to find where Louise had gone up to make out with a girl. He was like 15 years old.

Scott Galloway: You didn't promote that. You're that kind of mom.

Kara Swisher: No, I'm not promoting that. It was two in the morning.

Scott Galloway: When I used to come home from college. Two in the morning. Because I never got laid. My mom would put firewood in the fireplace. Like, Jesus Christ, man, go get them. No. She was like, Christ.

Kara Swisher: No, 15 used my Uber and two in the morning. No, he's not allowed to do that. No. 15, 2 in the morning. That's a little young. Yeah. So I found him on Snap Maps, of all things. And I knew where he was. And I said, get your-

Scott Galloway: You're the CCP. I know. You're tracking people with maps?

Kara Swisher: And I said, you're in blah, blah, blah. Get your ass home.

Scott Galloway: Do you use face recognition to find the girl and start calling her parents?

Kara Swisher: Stay away from my son. In any case. The militia Etheridge are coming for your ass. No, I found him on Snap Maps. And he didn't even, like, he didn't even- And he wrote me a text. I'll never forget. I saved. I took a picture. He goes, sometime it's going to be like that, chief.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, it's coming. That's what he wrote me. I love that.

Kara Swisher: And I was like, oh, he's so funny. Anyway, last thing. He talked about whether or not he'd sell the company. He did not answer. Yeah. What do you think of what he did?

Scott Galloway: I don't know what he did. Did he answer? Did he not answer?

Kara Swisher: No.

Scott Galloway: I'll give him this. He gave an impassioned reason for the amount of value they'll sell. But here's the thing. The right answer would be, in my view. Apple is coming next on the stage. Well, look, if you look at Twitter, Pinterest, Snap, the bottom line is, They've all been kind of 10-year, fun, cute experiments in the fact that they can't compete with these monopolies of Meta and Google. I mean, occasionally we talk about their innovation. It only gets so big. But they always break our hearts. And that is they go up. We talk ourselves into believing they're going to be able to carve out a niche. And then they freaking collapse. And that's what's going to happen to Twitter if it doesn't get acquired. Yep, yep. And these companies should be part of larger organizations, whether it's Comcast.

Kara Swisher: All right, for a reason, snap, who should it go to?

Scott Galloway: I would say actually I would think Disney would be interesting for Snap.

Kara Swisher: Oh Snap.

Scott Galloway: It joyous.

Kara Swisher: It nice.

Scott Galloway: It the same distribution they could have had with Twitter without all the fucking garbage.

Kara Swisher: They not need it. Yeah, Snap. Okay, good. Young people. Yeah, right. Okay, what about Twitter? If it doesn't, Elon thing.

Scott Galloway: I think Twitter is so damaged goods right now. Twitter needs a, I mean, we talked about it. Twitter just needs to totally reconstruct its business model and move as a subscription.

Kara Swisher: You should buy it.

Scott Galloway: Well, here's the thing. Subscription works. Like we were talking about HBO. It works when you have a superior product. HBO, for the majority of its life, had a superior product versus, you know, the A-Team or ABC's, you know, Wednesday movie of the week, whatever it was. And it appealed to a narrower audience and wanted high-quality TV where they could watch violence and sex. It's wrapped in fantastic storytelling. And people are willing to pay for that. And Twitter has a small group, and they're lying about how small it is. It's much smaller than they've advertised. But people would pay for it because it's a small commit. You and I are addicted to it. We pay for it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So they need a total rethink about their business model. I don't know what's going to happen. Actually, I think I know what's going to happen in the next couple weeks with them. But if anything, the chancery court is going to say, you're all wet. I think maybe his lawyer sat down with him the week before. I think they're already in discussions and said, you're going to lose. And they're saying, boss, you're going to lose. And he doesn't want to lose that publicly. So I think they're probably already in conversations around what the fee is for him to go away.

Kara Swisher: Then what happens?

Scott Galloway: Yeah, we'll see. That's the correct question. Because even if they give – even if he pays them $10 billion, which is $12 a share, Twitter hasn't demonstrated an ability to do great things with capital so far. What happens to the stock? Because it should be at $20, which means it should be trading about $15 billion less than now.

Kara Swisher: That's when you and I move in. That's when we come in.

Scott Galloway: That's when we come in.

Kara Swisher: That's when we come in. Let's get some bankers. There we go. Okay. Scott, really briefly, you asked Evan Spiegel a question about being a parent. a man really in this society. Do you have any advice for young fathers in terms of trying to balance the push and the pull of having that kind of scrutiny and that kind of pressure and also trying to manage a household with three kids and be a good partner?

Scott Galloway: Oh, gosh. I knew he was going to ask a man question, but go ahead. I mean, it's just so, I struggle with it every day. I mean, just before going on stage, I'm thinking about, I'm hosting a dinner after this. I'm thinking about, do I have 30 minutes in between the time I get off stage, 15 minutes to drive home, 15 minutes to read to Hart, who's our four and a half year old, before I have to go to this dinner so that I can have that precious time together, it's all-consuming. I think this is, as parents, what all of us struggle with all the time. I think that there's a lot of warranted attention around the fact that women are expected to be these multidimensional superwomen. And if they have careers, inevitably, if they're on a panel, the first thing that's asked is, how do you manage balance? And I don't think what gets a lot of attention is that I think men feel, or a lot of men, most men and a lot of women have this internal conflict and that as society has told me, and it's a more and more competitive society, I need to be a baller professionally. That's my job. My job is to go out and hunt the mastodon and bring home the meat. And if I haven't done that, I've failed as a man. At the same time, in this competitive society, to do that, you basically have to work all the fucking time. I've just never, I have never. He said that. He said, I didn't see my kids. I have never bought kids. I think balance is a myth. I did not see my kids the first five years of their life because I'm like, I got to make more money. And it was just that clear. And I'm not talented enough to make a lot of money without working my ass off. I have not been able to figure that out. And at the same time, it's very upsetting. Men have some of those same paternal, like, conflicted emotions. Like, fuck. He was talking about reading to. I'm not being a good dad. I'm not being a good partner. But at the same time, I've really failed on a cosmic level if I can't maintain the economic security of my household. And him, it's a little bit different because he's had economic security from a young age. But he has – The same person. You're laying off 2,000 people. And the comms people are like, we got to talk about this and we got to think this through. And it's like, well, you know, it's bedtime or it's bath time. And it's like, I'm sorry, I can't be there. I got a lot of people depending on me. And this tension and this – it's present for women and it's also present for men.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, it was a good moment. I really liked it. Also, Pete Buttigieg talked about it. He was negotiating that infrastructure stuff when he was in the hospital. One of his kids were quite sick. And so that was – he talked about fatherhood. Of course, his is under siege in a very different way across the country. It was – I thought that was really good. It was a great moment. It was a great question, Scott. I never would have asked it and I'm glad you did. Thank you. Anyway, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll talk about the dueling answers from Senator Klobuchar and the CEO of Amazon, and we'll play Tim Cook's big win.

[Ad break]

Kara Swisher: Scott, we're back with more from Code. Another big theme this week, antitrust legislation and competition. Senator Klobuchar, Amy Klobuchar joined us early on Tuesday to talk about the state of her big tech antitrust bill. Here's what she said.

[Audio clip plays]

Amy Klobuchar: Do you go talk to them or what do you, We continue to talk to them. We have made so many changes to the bills that have been in response to concerns that they have raised. At some point, we know that, for instance, just one example, the news organization bill, you know, when they claim that that is somehow going to break the internet, well, they've been doing it in the land down under, and it hasn't brought the internet under, basically, in Australia. So we know that we have examples in other countries where some of this stuff is going on. And as time goes on, that's going to become increasingly clear. So we continue to talk to them. But the truth is, you can't wait and be basically, you're becoming a patsy if you just sit there and wait for them to decide they suddenly like this bill, because they don't want to see any bills passed, unfortunately.

[End of audio clip]

Kara Swisher: All right. She was good. That was a good interview with her. She's a politician, so she talks.

Scott Galloway: Look, my observation is, look who you had here. Representative Khanna, Governor Newsom, Mayor Pete, Senator Klobuchar. Who else do we have that's here because they're running for president? I mean, they're all running for president.

Kara Swisher: Mark Cuban.

Scott Galloway: Oh, and Mark Cuban. You literally have. I think they're all running for president. I don't think Mark is.

Kara Swisher: Yeah. I'm cynical. And that is, I think this cost plus, Mark Cuban cost plus drugs.

Scott Galloway: Yes, that's what I said. It's a book. It's like a book. It's a great thing. I think he's a good man. I think it'll be great. I think it's, quite frankly, in the back of his mind is he's thinking it's a great platform to raise awareness to be drafted as a presidential candidate. I think they all wake up in the morning and say, hello, Madam President.

Kara Swisher: Yes, I think you say that. What did you think? Is the bill going to get passed or a big tick win this round?

Scott Galloway: I suspect. It feels like it's already being watered down. You know, I said fat chance about this bill, this Inflation Reduction Act and the infrastructure bill. So I'm not going to go. I don't know. Someone pointed that out to me. I think here's what it gets through. It gets through and it'll be so watered down as to be almost meaningless. It just won't. It's just death by a thousand cuts.

Kara Swisher: Okay. And then all the big tech executives, including Cinder, get up and say, act as if they're like open to it and they want to be regulated. And they have an army of lawyers and politicians that they have paid off. That is their job. That's the way the system works. So at this point.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, I don't. Look, I'm sort of, I don't know what the term is, bereft or resigned. But at least Senator Klobuchar is fighting the good fight. She's not afraid of them. I think she's very pragmatic. I think she's an impressive woman.

Kara Swisher: They were trying to make the case that it was overly broad, including Andy Jassy, one person who has been very active. And as opposed to Jeff, Andy goes to Washington and talks to people. He's the CEO of Amazon, obviously. Here's what he said.

[Audio clip plays]

Andy Jassy: There is such a crazy us versus them mentality in this country right now everywhere, including in how government is thinking about some of these larger companies. There aren't many, if any, big issues that have ever been solved by scapegoating or demonizing a group of people. And that's kind of what's happening right now. And I actually think that we have a much better chance of solving an issue that we may want to regulate and in a way that doesn't unintentionally hurt consumers or small and medium-sized businesses if the private and public sector work together and collaborate on that. And that has not been something that groups are willing to do so far. The tech industry has put $95 million in ads. And I've seen so many ads that Amy Klobuchar is breaking the internet. I don't believe she's breaking the internet. that, you know, you all play tough, too, if they're playing tough on the same way. Look, we want, we've been very clear for many months, and we have, we've shared this with everybody, including the senator, that we, let's figure out what we want to regulate. If you want to actually stop censorship of data, write a bill about that. If you want to change the way data privacy is conducted, write a bill about that.

[End of audio clip]

Kara Swisher: He makes it seem so easy. He gets to do whatever he wants. They don't.

Scott Galloway: Let's all work together, which means put more fucking espresso pods in the box. Don't go to the bathroom. Here's diapers, bitch. Oh, Andy, isn't he lovely? Let's work together. I know. That was just generous. Let's work together, Kara. Because they're really put into this. She made a joke about that. Her husband told her daughter, don't be mean to mom today. She's got four of the biggest companies in the world trying to get her, and Russia disbanded her because she had been in the Ukraine. And so, you know, she's definitely, I think she said she had three lawyers and they had 2,800. I'm sure that's an exaggeration on her part. But she's right. She's outmatched in terms of, this is a very powerful senator, but she's outmatched.

Kara Swisher: The thing, something very interesting and somewhat related happened with Amazon. And I think it's cogent or highlights the issue here. The majority of the big tech people you talk to, especially the CEO of Google, who is exceptionally talented and exceptionally likable. He did a nice job. Alphabet itself. And Google. All of it. Whatever. The seventh ring of hell. So he's essentially when you push him on a hard issue, like what are you going to do about privacy or this thing? A lot of thoughtful, these are complex problems, Kara. But we're open to talking to people. No, they're not. They're opening to pretend to listen. We're open to legislation. No, they're not. We're going to release the hounds and start giving money to anybody who gets in the way of this. And here's the thing that's so sad about it. It's what I call the illusion of complexity. These are complex problems. Well, this is how complex the problem was for Amazon. Amazon experienced with their new Lord of the Rings, they got critic bombed. And that is bad actors do what occasionally they do to you and me on Twitter. And that is a bunch of people, fake actors, showed up and started trashing it. And you don't know who's behind it or why. So what did Amazon do? They took it down. They implemented AI and identity. And they figured it out in like 48 hours. And they put it back up. And there's veracity around it on those reviews. So Amazon figured it out in 40 hours. But Sundar's like, it's too complex a problem. We can't figure it out. That was the joke I had is that when they talk about the smartest people ever, they act like smart and whenever there's something difficult. They're flummoxed. Election misinformation is a big, big problem. Oh, we kick off one account and 60% of it goes away. So this— I don't say it's easy. You know, Alex Samuels, who I really do trust. It's easier than they would claim. That is correct. It's about incentives, not about complexity. It's not easy and it moves in Morse all the time. And it's a nuisance to them in a lot of ways and a profit-sucking nuisance. They have a profit motive in creating the illusion of complexity around this. It's not—I think these problems are solvable. We're not talking about the realm of the possible. We're talking about the realm of the profitable.

Kara Swisher: Well, what's interesting is Jassy's not going down with a fight and neither is she. So we'll see who prevails there. And she may pull it out. She may get the votes. I feel like she would like break people's arms.

Scott Galloway: Well, it's fairly by the thing about this that's on her side is it's a bipartisan issue. And everybody hates big tech, but for different reasons. But they all share a disdain for these companies and public sentiment has turned on them. So we'll see.

Kara Swisher: Only issue is nobody really cares about tech legislation compared to many other legislation. So that's all.

Scott Galloway: Well, it's not the high – that's what's benefited tech is that people are like, oh, I like my maps. I'm not that mad at them. I think they have a harder time passing tech legislation than you do, say pharma, insulin prices that can enrage people. We'll see.

Kara Swisher: Another issue that Jassy talked about, he seemed, as usual, combative on labor unions. He said the Staten Island vote had disturbing irregularities and hinted at a prolonged battle. Interestingly, Christian Smalls came later. He happened to be in L.A. and he called and said, can I come? And it was too late for him to ask Jesse a question, which would have been irritating to Jesse, I'm sure. But, you know, Jesse's not the only one with union problems. And you talked about this in your presentation.

Scott Galloway: Unions have become the perfect enemy for corporations because they're ineffective. 46 of the 47 countries that have organized labor around the world have seen a massive decline. They've been cut in half in terms of membership. If it was a business, it would have been put out of business. And here's the thing. I'm a huge fan of unions, but they need to be organized. They need to be less corrupt. And they need to be totally focused on the well-being of their workers. Look, I think almost every union is not effective. I think that there should be one union, and it should be the federal government. And I think they should demand minimum wage. If minimum wage had just kept pace with productivity the last 50 years, it would be $23 a share.

Kara Swisher: That's right.

Scott Galloway: And here's what the great uncoupling was. in the early 70s, up until the 70s, productivity and wages largely were inextricably linked. And that is everybody got to share. Our society, government, workers got to share in the increases in productivity that we have registered. We're going to be more productive in one month this year than we were in an entire year in 1950. But in 1970, something happened. I don't know if it's Milton Freeman or Jack Welch or shareholder activism. All of a sudden, everything was optimized for shareholder value. And they found a lot of surplus compensation in workers. They found out workers are willing to work for less. And so they stopped raising their wages, and there was no minimum wage. And minimum wage has exploded from $7.25 to $7.25 in 13 years.

Kara Swisher: Yeah Jesse noted this but then he was as if he like well we paying I like you still not paying enough That not the comparison is obscene is obscene

Scott Galloway: Well I just don get it There should be one union Why wouldn we have okay minimum wage 25 bucks an hour federal minimum wage

Kara Swisher: Yeah. And here's the thing. You said the union is the government. The union is the government. It's the best union in the world. It's the most noble. It's the most concerned. It's not corrupt. You won't find them on their boats. Anyways, I think teachers unions have lost a lot of credibility. But anyways, 25 bucks a share. And let's be clear, the market would go down and it'd be worth it. Stocks would go down. It'd be worth it. Productivity would go up. Bring dignity back to work. Et cetera, et cetera. Anyway, we'll see. He's going to really, I think he's going to win on these issues, unfortunately. They've only got one. And that's, and they're, he kept saying irregularities in Stan. It was funny. Whatever. Anyway, we'll see where it goes. He says he can take care of them better than the unions can. And in many ways. He might be right on that.

Scott Galloway: Yes. And yet, and then they could also not take care of them. There's no leverage for workers in that relationship. And they will continue to have no leverage. He's like, they can go. I'm like, can't they?

Scott Galloway: They're disorganized. And I love the media. Like, a Starbucks in Wausau, Wisconsin unionizes, and everyone's talking about the return of unions. This is the ultimate dead cat bounce. There'll be some very well-publicized stories of the rejuvenation of unions, and they will resume their structural decline.

Kara Swisher: Yeah.

Scott Galloway: The government needs to move in here and restore dignity to work, full stop.

Kara Swisher: Another pair of co-attendees found themselves on opposite sides of an issue: Tim Cook and an audience member. Let's play a clip from the audience Q&A. "Not to make it personal, but I can't send my mom certain videos or she can't send me certain videos. And so we leave her out." "Buy your mom an iPhone." So that was great.

Scott Galloway: Tim, we talked primarily about Steve Jobs. There were some great questions. Of course, he had flown in from the event, the iPhone 14 event and all the announcements they made, which was great of him to do that. I appreciated that. I'm not sure if he had a choice, but there he is. He came and did a good job, actually.

Kara Swisher: They're perfect. They represent—the reason I have an iPhone is that I think it makes me more attractive. And the three of them are more attractive than any three Android executives you put on stage. But one of the things that was interesting about that, it was primarily—I wanted to keep it to Steve Jobs and the legacy and also the impact. I didn't want to talk about the next iPhone. I don't care. I mean, I do, but I don't. And so it was an interesting reflection for them. I'm not sure it would work, but I think it really did. People found it very moving, I think, in a lot of ways. It worked better than I thought it was going to.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, it was very thoughtful. It was people just thinking out loud about ideas. I thought Johnny Ive was tremendous. You really got a sense of why he was who he was, his impact on Apple. And I thought Lorene had some really amazing moments. And you got different versions of Steve Jobs. And they didn't hesitate to talk about more difficult parts. But from today's perspective, he seems less venal than lots of people.

Kara Swisher: All three of them were—I was really intimidated. We were on the stage with Evan and I got off and I saw all three of them just sitting there in line. And they all made eye contact with me because I was getting off. And I was too intimidated to introduce myself. I wanted to know them.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, I know. Easy for you to say.

Kara Swisher: But I was too intimidated to introduce myself and I regret that. Anyways, back to me. Yeah, it was really interesting. I thought it worked. It was very thoughtful. And I think they even found it hard. We had a conversation before, and it required them to think a little bit about legacy and things like that. So I thought it was very genuine. I think that's what I liked about it—they had very genuine reflections. It's very hard to be canned, actually. And I think they had reflections that were really important about care of duty, care of creation. I think Johnny talked about this a lot, carelessness in design. They talked a lot about ideas and the need for ideas. And one of the things I do believe: when he died, everything shifted. I just do. He was not perfect and he had warts all over him. But he definitely represented a passion for excellence that I think has carried on at Apple. You never really go, "This is a shoddy product," on anything you get from them. You may not like something and they may not do something. Well, we talked about Ping, for example, the social network. But I thought that they talked about the idea of passion, excellence, and the marriage of art and commerce in a way that we forget. I feel like everyone sort of took the wrong lessons from Steve Jobs away. And I think they did articulate that he would not like the present moment, especially politically, but also the lack of privacy. He talked a lot about privacy. And Lorene was very clear that he would be very outspoken now, and not on Twitter, but just outspoken. I agree with her. I think that's the case.

Scott Galloway: This is a tough one for me. When societies become wealthier and more educated, their reliance on a super being or church attendance goes down. So they try to fill that void with other super beings. And I think it's been somewhat unfortunate, but the closest thing we have to a religion is technology. And you can understand it. It's mystical. I don't know how my iPhone works. It can do amazing things. And I think Steve Jobs has become the Jesus Christ of this information economy. And I think it's set off—not through any fault of his own—but because of a variety of societal factors: the idolatry of money, the idolatry of innovators, the mysticism around technology.

Kara Swisher: Because the people that could develop on the platform, meaning?

Scott Galloway: We have decided that these are the new clergy, the new gods.

Kara Swisher: He was the only one at the time. The new idols.

Scott Galloway: Well, now Elon's taking that model. They just live by a different set of standards and it's bad for society.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, I would agree. One of the things Tim said: "We didn't design this so people would do the scrolling." I mean, you know what I mean? I think every interview with him, he talks about that. And I think the most famous one is when I asked him what he would do if he was in Mark Zuckerberg's situation when there was all that stuff on Cambridge Analytica and all the misinformation stuff. And he's really loath to insult. And he goes—and I've never seen him maybe once or twice do it. And Jobs liked insults, so it was a very different personality. And he said, "I never would have been in that situation."

Scott Galloway: I love Tim Cook because I think Tim Cook demonstrates a lot more grace than the majority of executives in big tech. He doesn't make it about him. He doesn't take the opportunity. I don't think I've ever really seen him shitpost anyone. "I wouldn't have been in this position." That's the closest I've ever seen him to criticize anybody.

Kara Swisher: I would agree. I like the fact that he comes from a background that probably wasn't easy for him to advance in the corporate world earlier in his career. But he doesn't make it an issue. I think people know about it. He's an adult. It's called being an adult.

Scott Galloway: One time I saw him raise his eyebrows once about Travis Kalanick. And I was like, "Oh, dear, he doesn't like him."

Kara Swisher: And what people—you pointed this out. But, okay, everyone talks about Steve Jobs. Unbelievable. When Steve Jobs died, Apple had a $300 billion market cap.

Scott Galloway: That's right. It's not $2.5 trillion. There isn't an individual alive. There isn't an individual anywhere in history that has added more shareholder value than Tim Cook.

Kara Swisher: Agreed. I argued that with two people here. I was like, "Have you noticed?" It's not about the money. I said, "They have lots of innovative products. Give me a break." AirPods and all kinds of stuff. AirPods, if they were on their own business, would be a Fortune 200 company. And sometimes—

Scott Galloway: The watch is really interesting. And the iPhone is the most profitable product in history because of the innovation he's brought. And shareholder value matters. A lot of people can retire sooner. A lot of people can take care of their parents. A lot of people can buy nice homes. They also haven't done it by privacy violations over and over again.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, they haven't fucked up democracy. They have issues in China.

Scott Galloway: Issues in China. They got to get out of China in a lot of ways.

Kara Swisher: Including that, they'd be the almost perfect company in that regard. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails of code.

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Kara Swisher: Okay, Scott, let's do some wins and fails of code. What's your favorite or least favorite moment of the week? I'll give you what I thought was the most insightful moment.

Scott Galloway: Okay, that's fine. And this is a prediction, and I know we don't do predictions on today, but I think I understand men my age. And the thing I love about these moments that you put together is occasionally there's an unscripted moment and you see something. When Sundar Pichai was asked about Twitter, he was just like, "Oh, God, keep me away from that septic tank." And then someone asked about Pinterest, and there was a weird pause. "What about something like Pinterest?" "You know, look, I can't comment on any M&A deal." I think so. I don't think so, but you're very good at asking the question. That's what they say. Google is speaking to Pinterest.

Kara Swisher: I would agree.

Scott Galloway: And I just like—I get men, and I don't know if you... I saw it. It's like, okay, something's going on here.

Kara Swisher: That's right. I think I said something.

Scott Galloway: And that's the wonderful thing about getting people together.

Kara Swisher: Mm-hmm.

Scott Galloway: Can't lie. He's not a very good poker player, that Sundar.

Kara Swisher: Well, just that moment, I looked around to see if anyone else—and I immediately sent a message to my friend. I'm like, "Pinterest is in play from Google."

Scott Galloway: Yeah. And maybe I get—

Kara Swisher: No, I think you're right. I think you read it exactly right. Your gut may be wrong, but I'm like, "Oh, wait. Something's going on here."

Scott Galloway: Indeed. They'd have to look at Pinterest. They have to look at Pinterest. That's a perfect fit with Google. It's information. It's all kinds of stuff. It adds a lot of really good technology.

Kara Swisher: Commerce.

Scott Galloway: Commerce. And they've failed in commerce. They've failed again and again. It's sort of a human search engine a little bit.

Kara Swisher: Yep, exactly. I think you're right. I think that's good. All right, what's something you didn't like?

Scott Galloway: There was nothing I really—I wouldn't say I didn't like. I mean, I find all these people who are just fascinated by tech, claiming they're not running for—I would love somebody to say. I think it'd be smart. I think if Senator Klobuchar or Mayor Pete or Secretary Buttigieg said, "You know what, I'm an ambitious woman. I'd like to be president. I have a vision for the country."

Kara Swisher: Well, Hillary Clinton did that. It didn't work for her.

Scott Galloway: Well, and they might say it's not my time because we've got a good president and I'm going to fight for him should he decide to run again. But, yeah, I'd love to be president and just leave it there. Instead, like, "No, I got on Delta to come out to this conference to just say I'm not running for president over and over." But meanwhile, be in front of a bunch of important tech people. I just find it like, come on, enough already. You're out in your car making out on Snap Maps or whatever the fuck it is. It's just like, come on. So that—a lot of eye rolling.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, yeah. I mean, either all of these people who are supposedly the most likely people to run for president seem to love you and come to Code.

Scott Galloway: Yeah. And I think that's part of that.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, that's because I'm going to try. I'm hedging my bets all over the map so I can get to the White House so I can hang out there.

Scott Galloway: There you go. Just hang out.

Kara Swisher: I don't want to do anything but go in that weird window.

Scott Galloway: You promised me a weekend in the Lincoln bedroom.

Kara Swisher: I know. You and I together. That's right. We're going to do it. 100%. We're going to sully the place, though.

Scott Galloway: 100%. We're going to sully it. We're going to trump it up.

Kara Swisher: I like it. I'm sure he sullied it already. So anyway, my favorite moment—I think all of it. It was really good. I felt really good as a whole. It was definitely good. I really liked doing the climate stuff. I thought it was good. I thought John Doerr was quite good. There wasn't a—someone said, "What's your favorite piece?" I don't have one. I thought they were all excellent.

Scott Galloway: John Doerr just reeks of class.

Kara Swisher: I know. I think they all brought it from Mark Cuban to the very last one. They all brought it. And by the way, they didn't have to. And they did. And I thought nobody was fake. Very little talking pointy. They were really good interviews. All the people who did other interviews, like yourself and Preet Bharara, did a great job. I thought the food was amazing.

Scott Galloway: The food was good, yeah.

Kara Swisher: The staff did a beautiful job. The signage. And I loved the last day of climate change stuff. I thought they were great. Everybody stuck around. We had always had a problem with that. I think I love those panels. I love the strawberries from Oishi and the Nova meat. And there wasn't a thing I didn't like about it, I have to say.

Scott Galloway: That's my win. My win is this conference and your 20 years. And I think there's something bigger here. Like you, for the last 20, when you started this 20 years ago, it was a different world. And your background and the fact that you kind of—what I'll say—live out loud. I think that this conference gave you—I think you're the first person to kind of pull this off for 20 years. Klaus Schwab has kind of done it with the World Economic Forum, but that's got a different flavor. And I just really—I love the fact and I respect the fact that you're going out while everyone is applauding.

Kara Swisher: Yeah.

Scott Galloway: You're pulling the plug on it while it's still the number one rated show. So I think that takes a lot of discipline.

Kara Swisher: I like that. I have something else to do.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, but most people can't give up the temptation.

Kara Swisher: Really? Most people, they have their show canceled. I got other things to do. Have a new podcast coming? We debut. Just take the fucking compliments.

Scott Galloway: I will. Fine.

Kara Swisher: Okay, good. Thank you so much. I can't believe it. How smart I am. Do you have a fail?

Scott Galloway: No. That's my win. Nothing. Not a thing.

Kara Swisher: My fail. It's not really a fail. I think that your leaders—I think the queen has been such a pillar of grace. I mean, if you were to try and embody what's wonderful about Britain, a lot of it would be—Britain, they believe in the rule of fair play. They're gentle men and gentle women. That's what they think.

Scott Galloway: Well, go ahead.

Kara Swisher: Well, I think she demonstrates she has consistently reinforced a civil civilization. She has. And I think she's always—tremendous service to her country. Non-divisive. So it's got to be a moment for whatever it is, the 65 million citizens, where they really collectively mourn someone who everyone kind of feels a little bit that she was their sister, then their mother, then their grandmother. So I think that's—I don't know what you call it a fail. I guess it's a win. But it's a nice moment when Britain—monarchies in that whole situation, it's man-made. That institution was invented by them. And it's a nice moment for them to reflect on not only her, but the—

Scott Galloway: Civility.

Kara Swisher: Yeah. I agree. It does demonstrate grace. And dovetailing with Code, one of the things I was trying very hard was to talk about divisiveness and the ability to talk to a lot of people. Even Hanand Gheera has talked about persuasion and getting along. Almost everybody's talked about that. And I wanted to foster more than the "you suck," which some of them do. It was "what are you going to do about it now?" And that's why we did the climate change. "What are we going to do?" All right, enough. "What are we going to do?" But she never gave into the temptation to start criticizing the other side.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, which was great.

Kara Swisher: Which was great. I think that was good. And that's what we tried to do here. So on to our new things. That's the show, Scott. But you're back. So that's what's critical.

Scott Galloway: Hello, ladies and gentlemen. I can't believe how much people missed you.

Kara Swisher: That's right. They missed you so much.

Scott Galloway: They did. For good reason.

Kara Swisher: They missed us together. For good reason. Anyway, we'll be dropping bonus episodes of Code interviews in coming weeks, starting with a full Evan Spiegel interview in the feed on Saturday. Scott did an amazing job, as you'll see when you hear the rest of it. Da-da!

Scott Galloway: No, he's back. Oh, my God. It's so good to have me back.

Kara Swisher: It's so good. You missed it. Be honest. You really missed it.

Scott Galloway: I got a little bit bored. I got a little bit bored.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, you do. That's what happens. And this is fun for you. I think you like me.

Scott Galloway: I think you like me. You really like me.

Kara Swisher: Read us out, Scott. You have to read us out.

Scott Galloway: Today's episode was produced by Lara Neiman, Evan Angle, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie and Jatot engineered this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows and Miel Severo. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. He's a total douchebag, but he's your douchebag, and he's back.